Bio-adhesives or sealants are used to suture or coat tissues at surgery, or are used as a bleeding-preventing agent (hemostasis), a body fluid and blood blocking agent, or the like. Bio-adhesives or sealants are required to have biocompatibility due to a contact with the skin, to have no toxicity and risk in the body, to be biodegradable, and not to obstruct the healing of the body.
Medical adhesive materials, which are currently practically used, include cyanoacrylates, fibrin glues, gelatin glues, and polyurethanes. A medical tissue adhesive of octyl cyanoacrylate, which was commercially available under the trade name “Dermabond” from Closure Medical Corp., USA, was approved for marketing by the EC in August, 1997 and approved for use by the US FDA in 1998. However, cyanoacrylate-based adhesives may obstruct wound healing since the solid products thereof are inflexible and hard, and are easy to become foreign materials since they are difficult to degrade in the body and are thus encapsulated. Moreover, fibrin glues may cause the separation of generated fibrin clots from tissues since the adhesive strength thereof is significantly low, and may cause a concern about viral infection since they are blood materials.
In addition to the foregoing medical adhesives, Korean Patent Publication No. 10-2009-0083484 discloses a two-component adhesive for medical use (Product name: LYDEX) containing an aldehyded dextran powder and an ϵ-poly-L-lysine powder, the adhesive being prepared by freeze-drying and then mechanical pulverization. The two-component adhesive is characterized by being a powder type medical adhesive, but it requires a relatively long time for gel degradation and does not obtain a desirable moisture absorption effect. Therefore, there is an increasing demand for novel medical adhesives having improved features in view of degradation time, adhesive strength, and moisture absorption power.
Throughout the entire specification, many papers and patent documents are referenced and their citations are represented. The disclosure of the cited papers and patent documents are entirely incorporated by reference into the present specification and the level of the technical field within which the present invention falls, and the details of the present invention are explained more clearly.